


Every Rose Has Its Thorns

by aquila_stars



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M, Murder, Murder Mystery, Mystery, Untold Cases of Sherlock Holmes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-18
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:01:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29533062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aquila_stars/pseuds/aquila_stars
Summary: Rosamund Mary Watson. Rosie Watson. The daughter of John and Mary Watson. Whatever name she is greeted by, the 16-year-old has had enough. Secrets have been kept, lies have been told, and all she every seems to do is sit on the side-lines. But when she is thrown head-first into a new case, Rosie begins to realise a detective's life is not all it first seems. When a case sends her delving into her mother's past, can Rosie Watson discover who she really is?
Relationships: Mary Morstan/John Watson, Rosamund Mary "Rosie" Watson/Original Male Character(s), Sherlock Holmes & John Watson, Sherlock Holmes & John Watson & Rosamund Mary "Rosie" Watson, Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Kudos: 1





	Every Rose Has Its Thorns

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! This is my first fanfic on AO3, so please feel free to leave feedback in the comments, or leave kudos if you feel like it. I'd also love for you to recommend me other fanfics or interact with me if you want. Not much happens in this chapter as it is just an introduction to Rosie's character and her relationship with others. I hope you enjoy Rosie's story as much as I enjoyed writing it  
> ~ Chris

4:00pm January 4th 

Snow fell with soft fingertip plunks against the roof of Baker Street. Cars passed like snails in front of the rows of flats and shops, the gentle light of Speedy's warming the chilly glow of the snow. The Christmas holidays were over, and several teenagers from schools trudged home through the snow, occasionally throwing snowballs and murmuring exclamations of delight and wonder. Snow in London is rare, and snow in the heart of London is precious.

One snowball hit the door of 221B Baker Street with a thump, and a group of chuckling boys watched as a girl's face appeared for a second at the windows. A frown creased her forehead, and her blond hair was pulled back into a messy bun. Her steely blue eyes danced with amusement as the boys stuck out their tongues and swore. In response she snorted and held up her middle finger. The schoolboys continued on, but the girl remained at the window for a while longer. 

From across the street, she watched a cab pull up and a man with inky black curls jump out, snow falling onto his head like stars, and his hair the night sky. A few seconds later another man jumped out, his greying blond hair swept back, and a look of disbelief crossing his face as he stared at the man in the trench coat. After a few minutes of deliberation, the men both stepped back into the cab and the girl watched with disappointment as it climbed back down the street before disappearing at the corner. 

Rosie Watson sighed, stretching her arms up and yawning like a lap dog. She turned her head and glanced around Sherlock's flat. It was a mess, as always, and smelt like he had been experimenting again. What with, she could only speculate. She wasn't sure she wanted to know anyway. Crossing the room, she reached the doorway and headed back upstairs to her and her dad's flat. 

After her mother's death, John couldn't face living in their house a day longer, and with 221B barely safe for adults, let alone toddlers, Sherlock made the decision that John and Rosie would do best in 221C. That way, John could continue solving cases with him, and Rosie could grow up out of harm's way, or so he thought. And in a way she did. She was never involved in one of his cases, was never allowed to help him solve crimes, and spent the majority of her time at school, sat in a waiting room in Scotland Yard filling in paperwork (Greg Lestrade is not terribly organised) or having tea with Mrs Hudson. She did this so much that it became tradition. Whenever she got home from school, Rosie Watson would seek out Mrs Hudson for tea, listening to her comments about how she had "John's heart and Sherlock's brains" and "wasn't that a good thing too!" To which Rosie would groan and reply that her dad was not gay, and he and Sherlock were not a couple. Mrs Hudson would just raise an eyebrow and shrug nonchalantly, but the gleam in her eyes would suggest she thought different. 

Today was one of the days when neither John and Sherlock, nor Mrs Hudson was in when she got home from a school, and she was once again greeted with the silence of the flat. When she reached 221C, she pulled off her shoes and collapsed onto the sofa with a sigh, turing to face the ceiling. The white swirls of paint did nothing to help her oncoming headache, so she instead turned her attention to the bookshelves on the other side of the room. Most of the books were her dad's biology and study textbooks, but the two top shelves were reserved for newspapers and magazines, and Rosie's favourite books. Shifting her weight and sitting up, Rosie stared at the shelves for a few seconds, before making her decision and jumping up to inspect them. For a few minutes she rifled around a the back of the shelf filled with magazines, before she found what she was looking for and pulled out a CD worn with scratches; the marks of time that showed just how much it had been played. It was hidden at the back of the shelves, and one look at it made tears swim in her eyes. Two words were scribbled in a handwriting she would never know across the front, one she had seen so many times she was familiar with the gentle curve of the letters and the sharp pen stokes. Two words that read: 

MISS YOU 

Rosie missed her mother more than she would ever let John and Sherlock know. Her father had initially given her the DVD on her fifth birthday, in the joe that it would quell further questions and prying. He sat Pair on his knee and told her the story of her mother, and she ran to put the DVD on, watching it attentively as the familiar face flashed on screen. For the next two years, Rosie had watched the DVD every day, mouthing along with the words and mirroring her mother's expressions. 

She supposed she did look quite like her mother. Her father saw it, she guessed. And so did Sherlock. He was tactful enough to never mention it, but as time wore on, she was beginning to resemble Mary Watson more and more. 

After those two years, her father had snapped. He was forced to watch his dead wife every day, and it was beginning to get to him. He loved her and he missed her, and seeing her everyday broke his heart. So Rosie was told to keep the DVD in her bedroom, and save it for when she was older. She did as he asked, and John never saw her watching the DVD again. Or so he must think. 

In reality, Rosie watched the video almost every day, skipping some days until it gradually became once and week, and then morphed into whenever she had a terrible day, or a nightmare. Placing the DVD into the DVD player and pressing okay on the remote, Rosie settled back onto the sofa, now and then mouthing along to her mother's words, but mainly just allowing her mind to wander. Her eyes crossed the room a few times before settling on the photo frames on the mantle piece. Her favourite photo stood in the center, where five year old Rosie held an ice cream, and was surrounded by her father, who was smiling at her, Sherlock, who was smiling at his phone, Lestrade who was too invested in his own ice cream to be paying attention, Molly who was too invested in Sherlock, and Mrs Hudson, who was, well, Mrs Hudson. It was a birthday tradition that she and her family went for ice cream, and she always ordered strawberry. 

Her thoughts were cut short as the video ended, and she collected the DVD, treasuring it in her hands before carefully hiding it back where she found it. Making her way back to the sofa she yawned again, twisting a loose strand of hair from her finger and letting herself slip out of consciousness as her eyes drifted slowly closed.

... 

6:00pm 

Loud footsteps on the stairs of 221B rang out in the silence as Sherlock bounded up the stairs to his flat. 

"Can you believe it, John?! The cat all along. I knew from the start something was odd about it." 

The blond man muttering threats under his breath followed him, but instead of entering 221B, he stood in the doorway and watched Sherlock rush to the computer. John rolled his eyes and scoffed. 

"I'm gonna go upstairs and check on Rosie, okay?" 

"Fine," Sherlock replied, "but she's clearly okay anyway. She came in here and was looking out of the window a few hours ago..." He trailed off. "The cheek of it! John, she stole my hand!" 

John said nothing, but a look of confusion flashed across his face. 

"She stole your what?" 

"My hand! The hand, John! I was testing the effects of different types of pickling techniques on human organs." Sherlock yelled, picking up a book and chucking it at him. 

"And when you say pickling you mean..." 

"Sardines, olives, picked onions, general pickled...stuff." 

John sighed. "Right, well I'm going to check on her anyway." 

Hearing no response from his flatmate, John sighed and turned to the stairs leading up to 221C. It had taken a week for Sherlock to persuade Mycroft to pay for the redecoration of the flat, as when John first planned to move in with Rosie, it was nothing more than uninhabitable. Eventually, Mycroft being the pushover that he is, and Sherlock promising to pay him off in cake, agreed, and what used to be the damp and dingy location of Jim Moriarty's first test for Sherlock was now a bright and cheerful flat. When John entered, he found Rosie Watson asleep on the sofa, strands of blond hair fallen across her face and a peaceful expression written across her features. He chuckled slightly and moved over to her, lifting her head and taking a seat o the sofa, before resting her head back on his lap and brushing the hair out of her face. She was so much like her mother; the way she smiled and laughed - God that laugh - it killed him every time he heard it. Rosie was headstrong like her mother. He was so independent sometimes he wondered if she even needed him. If she could manage without him and Sherlock. Then he would begin to wonder how similar to Mary Rosie actually was: his wife kept secrets. What was Rosie keeping from him? A voice stirred him from his thoughts. 

"I am awake, y'know." He looked down to find Rosie grinning up at him, an amused glint in her eyes. 

"Well how was I supposed to know?" 

"You woke me up!" 

"Did not!" 

"Did too! Your feet are so loud I can hear you from miles away." 

"That wasn't me, that was Sherlock!" 

"Sure...." Rosie trailed off, side-glancing Sherlock,who had appeared in the doorway and was watching them silently with curious eyes. 

"Just keep telling yourself that." She continued. "You may need to sort it out before your next case though. Those shoes are enough to give you away on their own." 

"How was school?" John asked. 

"School was fine." 

In reality school was anything but fine. Today was her first day at her new school. She didn't exactly mean to end up at a new school, buy at her old one she had been widely accepted as the 'book-worm girl' and dismissed as nothing of importance - she wasn't clever, she wasn't pretty, and she wasn't talkative. Or so they thought. Rosie was in fact, the opposite. Her intelligence was just as good as Sherlock's - though nobody seemed to pick up on the fact, and even Sherlock himself remained unknowing of it. Her brains were her secret, and she intended for them to stay that way. Nobody was interesting enough, lessons were boring and life was too ordinary for her to bother sharing her secret. Never had Rosie been asked to help on a case. Never had she been allowed to tag along, and never, she supposed, would she ever be. 

Once in an attempt to persuade her father to let her come on at least one case, she decided to show off her intelligence and came home with a glowing report card - her grades had never been higher - and still she was refused any excitement or danger of the case, and still everyone was none the wiser to her intelligence. When she'd finally had enough, she texted Sherlock to meet her at the school gates, grabbed him by the collar of his via, and much to his protestations she dragged him inside the school to the headteacher's office, where she released him, and then demanded Sherlock deduced him. Sherlock pulled through, and the headteacher could be seen minutes later emerging from the office very red in the face, shaking Rosie's hand and wishing her luck at her new school. 

Her new school was Deepdean High School, and for a first day, it had been pretty average, but not gone as expected. John noticed her silence and nudged her gently. She sat up and he put his arm around her. 

"You sure...?" He asked gently. 

"John, I'm pretty sure I know how my day was." Her father scoffed and rolled his eyes in exasperation. 

"Oh for the last time, don't call me John!" 

"Fine! Dr John." Rosie replied with a cheeky smile. 

"No, not that either!" 

"Fine! Dr John Watson of the fifth Northumberland Fusiliers, three years in Afghanistan, a veteran of Kandahar, Helmand and Bart's bloody hospital!" Rosie morphed her expression into one of seriousness and determination, raising her hand and giving her dad a little mock salute. John rolled his eyes, and turned to Sherlock, who was stood in the doorway chuckling to himself. 

"Sherlock, tell her to stop!" Sherlock said nothing but smiled at Rosie and nodded proudly. 

"Hey, he was the one who taught me that." Rosie spoke up. 

"Of course he was," John muttered under his breath, giving Sherlock a death stare. Sherlock finally seemed to realise he had been stood at the door for a number of minutes, and seizing the break in conversation as an opportunity to talk, motioned to John to come and join him. 

"John! Get your coat, I've found another one!" 

"You just got back though!" Rosie cried. It didn't take her deduction skills to work out that what she'd said was true. Apart from their windswept hair and the light flakes of snow still resting on Sherlock's coat, the guilt on their faces said enough. 

A brief look of apology crossed Sherlock's face as he tied his scarf tighter around his neck and met Rosie's gaze. 

"Sorry Rosie, I need an assistant." 

John glared at Sherlock again. "I am not your assistant!" Sherlock scoffed and left the flat, his trench coat trailing behind him. John stood as well, and grabbed his coat from the back of the sofa. 

"Yes, you are!" Sherlock shouted up the stairs to him. 

"Fine, yes I am!" 

Rosie interrupted her parents bickering with a question. " What about me?" 

"There's food in the fridge - " Sherlock stuck his head around the door and cut John off. 

"Put my pickled hand back though will you?" 

" Yes, thank you Sherlock." John said sternly before continuing. "There's food in the fridge, and Mrs Hudson can look after you." 

"Mrs Hudson went to Bristol to visit her sister, remember?" Sherlock again stuck his head around the door again. 

"John! Hurry up! Murder in a packed theatre! This'll be one for the blog!" John sighed heavily. 

"I'll call Greg then." Sherlock looked at Rosie with clear confusion. 

'Greg?' He mouthed at her, and she replied with a shrug. John sighed again, and shut his yes for a second. Sherlock and Rosie's antics would be the death of him. 

"You'll be fine." He said quietly, and hugged her. 

"See you later, Rosie!" Sherlock nodded, and gave her a small salute. Rosie returned the gesture with a sad smile. 

"See ya, Sherlock Holmes." Sherlock left the flat, running down the stairs and opening the door before going out into the street to hail a cab. John watched him go and chuckled to himself, starting to follow him, but the sight of his daughter in the corner of his eye made him stop. Her eyes were cast down to the floor, and she scuffed a mark on the carpet with her shoes. John hesitated, and walked back over to her, engulfing her in another hug. 

"I'll be back soon, okay?" 

"Okay." Rosie whispered in reply. John smiled and ran after Sherlock. The door of 221C swung shut with a bang as they left. 

And just like that they were gone, as quickly as they had arrived. Rosie sighed and ran a hand through her hair. Moving across the flat, she reached the door to her bedroom and gently opened it, flipping down on her bed and staring at the ceiling. She moved her gaze to the sketchbook on her desk and gave a small smile. She loved art. Her favourite drawing was one she'd manged to capture of Sherlock in his mind palace. She doubted he even realized she had drawn it. Smiling fondly at the memory, she turned her attention to the pinboard above the desk. It was plastered in postcards and photos of locations around the world. She had barely left London, let alone England, and dreamed of exotic countries and solving crimes. Someday she would be the world's second consulting detective, she vowed. Someday she would travel anywhere she wanted. Someday. 

Someday. 


End file.
